TUC prepare employment law changes

The TUC recently published a Proposal for a Trade Union Freedom Bill. In more detail, the Bill seeks to make incremental changes to the law on industrial action by reducing the regulatory burdens which frustrate unions' ability to organise industrial action and provide improved protection to those exercising their basic rights to take industrial action. The Bill also prioritises policy proposals which will make a very substantial and practical difference to unions when seeking to organise industrial action to ensure that members' democratic wishes are effectively expressed.

The proposals in the Bill include:

- Improved protection from dismissal and more effective remedies for workers taking part in official industrial action;

- Simplification of the complex regulations on notices and ballots which restrict the ability of unions to organise industrial action where a clear majority of members have voted in support; and

- Modernisation of what constitutes a trade dispute, enabling limited forms of supportive action, thereby ensuring that UK industrial action laws reflect changes in UK labour market, including increased contracting out and enabling unions to respond where employers take steps to outsource work during the course of a dispute with a view to breaking a strike.

There should be some interesting times ahead in employment/industrial relations if this proposal ends up on the statute book.

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